moonslav59

It's not just about positional need. Until Moncada becomes a better fielder than Shaw at 3B, he won't be our starting 3Bman. He's not going to be our 2Bman either, unless we trade Pedey (not happening). He may learn LF, but that along with 3B, that may take him a year or more to learn sufficiently, if his 2B pace is any indication. Yeah, I agree, it makes little sense to put a "five tool" guy at DH, but I'm noy sure the fielding "tool" is going to come to fruition for quite some time, so there's conflict with the other bid no-no in MLB: you don't keep a great hitter down on the farm forever, just because he's taking too long to master a position well enough to win one.

5 tool players don't always become plus fielders. I don't like the idea of DH'ing Moncada either, but I have the feeling it's going to take longer than many think it will for him to become an average fielder at 3B. He hasn't even become good enough at 2B yet.

That was a magical season. I'm not rying to put down Yaz by pumping up Pap, but you have to admit, no one has ever done what Papi has done either.

I don't disagree, but we do have one intangible: Big Papi.

I don't disagree, but if Moncada's bat is ML ready, and we haven't signed Encarnacion, I'd be fine with Moncada DH'ing FT until he masters a position.

Yaz did everything a player can do to almost single-handedly lead his team into the playoff. Papi has done the same in the post season.

[/b] yeah, you should 't diss Iwa like that! Lol

I actually see vas and Leon as our primary catchers with swi in the mix at C, LF, 1B and maybe DH. Be I in lf. Moncada/Shaw at 3B and ha ram at 1B and DH. Young can also DH.

True. But so do all the other AL teams.

The 67 team did not have a Papi, a balanced offense, or three top pitchers.

Here's something from MLBTRs.... By Steve Adams | August 4, 2016 at 9:15am CDT Top Red Sox prospect Yoan Moncada may not quite be ready to follow Andrew Benintendi to the majors, but GM Mike Hazen says he is playing his way into the team’s near-term plans, as Jason Mastrodonato of the Boston Herald writes. Moncada’s big numbers at Double-A have prompted a move to third base, where he could play at the big league level in relatively short order. Hazen analogized the situation to that of Mookie Betts, who also shifted off of second base — in his case, to the outfield — because he was ready to play but was blocked by stalwart Dustin Pedroia. As for timing of a big league promotion, Hazen declined to offer an opinion, but did note that Moncada has had a very different path to this point than did Benintendi. Also, as Mastrodonato notes, he needs to polish his hitting approach and refine his mechanics from both sides of the plate Seems like my suggestion was not as "silly" as some thought it was. Sometimes "normal" protocol takes a back seat when a prospect nears ML readiness with the bat but is blocked in the field.

The good start perhaps got our expectations higher than they should have been, but I still think, when healthy, we match up pretty well with any other AL team, especially when you look at a playoff situation where only 3-4 starters are needed and 2-3 top RP'ers gain value, we look pretty good. If we can get into the playoffs we may even have a better chance than any other AL team. Here's a look at some numbers: AL starting pitchers WAR 3) Price 8) Wright 11) Porcello Pomeranz still ranks #16 in NL WAR, even after being traded weeks ago. (Toronto has #6 Sanchez-soon to be moved to the pen to "save his arm", 9- Estrada & 12- Stroman and 15-JA Happ. The Guardians and CWS have 2 in the top 15. The Rangers none. The Tigers 1. The O's 1 at #14.) ERA- Pomeranz ranks 5th in the NL at 63. 6) Wright 72 10) Porcello 78 22) Price 97 TOR has #2 (in pen now), 5, 8 & 29 CLE has #9, 12 (on DL .now), 14 and 25 As you can see, we appear to be as good, if not better than just about every other AL team in this area. If Uehara can return and be somewhat close to "form", our top 3-4 RP'ers match up pretty well with other AL teams. Maybe these are big ifs, but I still think we have a good shot this year. Too bad we couldn't have made that one more big acquisition last winter for Papi's last season.

Another way of looking at this data is that only one team has lost less games than us when scoring 3 runs or less (TEX 26, BOS 30). Every team loses all its games when scoring zero runs. Winning with just one run scored is very difficult for every team as well. I'd like to see the data on W-L records when scoring 2-3 runs, 3-4 runs and 2-4 runs.

They did stick with Holt through his struggles and then gave him the job again after returning from the injury... to long if you ask me, but other in-house choices were very limited. I agree on Holt>Brentz, so Beni was really the only non-trade option. I'm glad we didn't overpay for Beltran, but there must have been some sort of DMac, de Aza, Podsednik type cheaper option out there. Holt hasn't really blown Young away vs RHPs like he was supposed to- not so much our of him doing poorly (.775 is not bad), but more out of Young doing better than expected vs RHPs (.735). I've caught some flack for including Holt in several of my trade suggestions for this coming winter due to my belief that some GM might value him more as a starter than we do as a super sub, and because I do not really think he is more than just a short-term or very short-term solution at any position, except maybe 2B. Don't get me wrong, especially on a team with a FT DH that limits depth felxibility, a guy like Holt has tremendous value that is often unseen, as a manager's choices are increased even when a player like Holt is not even being used. He lengthens the bench. Not many players can play 7 positions well enough to not be an embarrassment. When it comes to next year's roster construction, I see a squeeze or bottleneck of 25 man roster spots. I am not trying to devalue Holt and the flexibility he brings. I'm not trying to predict what Sox management will do or tell them what to do. I'm not pretending to know more than they do, but I see it this way: Hernandez is a better fielder at SS and 3B and maybe 2B. Shaw can play 1B and probably Swihart will be given some reps there over the winter. With Benintendi on the rsoter, and Young returning next year, and Swihart probably being viewed as the 4th or 5th OF'er, Holt would be the 6th OF'er. While a 6th OF'er on the roster is valuable, it's not as valuable as a 4th or 5th OF'er. I'm not for handing Holt away. I'd be happy to have him on the 25 man roster and Hernandez or Swihart in AAA as added depth, but I realize we will need to give up value to get value in return. Holt's 3 years of low-cost team control has a lot of value. I think including him as part of a larger package may be essential in landing the best return possible in trade. With just about $30M to spend this winter and staying near the luxury limit, we'll have a number of slots to fill, if we want to get more competitive: SP1 or SP2 DH RP2 or RP3 RP4 of RP5 To fill these 4 slots to the best of our abilities, we almost certainly will need to make a trade to lessen the financial implication that filling them by free agency only would surely create. The fact that there is no top quality SP1 or SP2 on the FA market this winter pretty much means we have two choices there: stay as is or improve via trade. I'm already fearful we have gone too far trading away our fine prospects, so I look at areas on our roster that we appear to be deep and strong. I think the step down in roster flexibility trading away Holt would be more than offset by the gain in the position we trade for, and that the step "down" to his replacements may not be an actual minus anyway (Hernandez>Holt in IF, Shaw/Swihart > Holt at 1B & Beni/Young/Swihart> Holt in the OF), except for the flexibility part. If trading Holt as part of the package helps reduce the prospect portion of the trade I believe will be made, then we have to stay open to the diea or maybe even try to force the idea on the other GM.

...and Steven Wright has been the example that makes your point. I'm hoping ERod's recent success is a sign we don't need another starter this year, but then there's the Pomeranz question.

Quote Originally Posted by moonslav59 View Post That was one reason I was against the Espinoza trade. We won't be able to retool the farm as easily as before. The rules have changed. We're banned from IFA's for a year. We probably won't be getting any top 7 draft picks for a while. Yeah, far away prospects are highly speculative, but Espi was the big hope for me. Our current top, under 21 prospects are: 19 Devers 17 Groome 20 Kopech 19 Basabe 20 Ockimey 20 Chavis 18 Raudes 20 Longhi 19 Y Aybar 20 Pennington I like Devers, Groome, and Kopech, but these are are at least 3+ year away. But I'm not worried, with all their young players, they can find free agents to fill out holes on their rosters. I only listed the prospects 20 or younger. Hopefully some of these guys will fill the gap... 21 Moncada 22 Benintendi 22 S Travis 25 Johnson 23 Hernandez 22 Dubon 21 Chatham 22 TBall 22 Lakins 25 K Martin 21 Anderson 23 Shepherd 21 Dalbec To go along with the young core of... 23 Betts, Bogey, ERod 24 Swihart, Owens 25 Vazquez 26 JBJ, Barnes, Shaw Our luck with FAs has been close to zero,

That was one reason I was against the Espinoza trade. We won't be able to retool the farm as easily as before. The rules have changed. We're banned from IFA's for a year. We probably won't be getting any top 7 draft picks for a while. Yeah, far away prospects are highly speculative, but Espi was the big hope for me. Our current top, under 21 prospects are: 19 Devers 17 Groome 20 Kopech 19 Basabe 20 Ockimey 20 Chavis 18 Raudes 20 Longhi 19 Y Aybar 20 Pennington

I was hoping Beni got up with 2 on. Oh well. Tough loss.

MLB.com ranks the Yanks farm #2 now and the Sox #6.

2016 Splits vs RHP (90+ PAs) 1.124 Ortiz .950 JBJ (.791 in 2015) .918 Betts (.851 career) .854 Bogey (.735 in 2015) .844 Shaw (.801 career) .840 Pedey .775 Holt .734 Young (.585 in 2015) [.727 Swihart career] [.590 Vazquez career] vs LHP (35+ PAs) 1.233 Leon 1.069 Ramirez 1.042 Young (.972 in 2015) .876 Bogey (.892 in 2015) .797 JBJ (.918 in 2015) .791 Ortiz .771 Vazquez (.643 career) .770 Betts (.821 career) .703 Pedroia .685 Brentz .618 Shaw(.794 career) .721 Ramirez [.673 Swihart career] AWAY (55+ PAs) 1.091 Young .853 Ortiz .826 Betts .818 JBJ .801 Bogey .799 Pedey .778 Ramirez .741 Holt .662 Shaw .626 Vazquez HOME 1.179 Ortiz .971 JBJ .941 Betts .937 Leon .903 Bogey .889 Shaw .826 Ramirez .826 Pedroia .710 Holt .681 Young .552 Vazquez

Sox OPS in the second half of 2016: 1.017 Betts .852 Pedroia .835 Bogaerts .821 Ramirez .815 Bradley .805 Shaw .782 Leon .710 Ortiz .710 Holt Nobody with more than 36 PAs has an OPS below .710. How about the last 365 days: 1.070 Ortiz .918 Bradley .906 Betts .890 Leon (133 PAs) .846 Young (Sox only- 142 PAs) .839 Bogey .825 Pedroia .793 Swihart (214 PAs) .785 Shaw .759 Ramirez .714 Rutledge (133 PAs) .705 Holt .655 Castillo (194) .651 Brentz (60) .583 Vazquez (176) .571 Sandoval (149) .551 Marrero (56) .537 Hanigan (167) .495 A Hill (47-Sox only) .464 Craig (29) Out top 9 players by PAs are all above .705. Eight are above .758. Seven are above .784. I'm not sure any team has this balance.

I never said I didn't value SP'er depth. I just said I see Johnson as probably nothing more than starter depth. When I advocate trading for a top of rotation SP'er, I rarely include a current starter in our rotation, so in a sense, I am advocating improving the top of our rotation and our 6th, 7th and 8th starters by attrition.

Certainly being #6 or #10 makes little difference in the Sox list as 5 are clearly separated from the others. Nobody views him as a possible #1 or #2 type pitcher. My guess is being a good #3 slot SP'er is his highest upside potential, but pitchers surprise us all the time- just not ours that often (to the good). Unless we trade a SP'er, I do not see Johnson unseating anyone in our current rotation, so maybe his best value will be as starter depth and pen help.

MLB.com just released its midseason farm rankings that take into account deadline trades: http://m.mlb.com/news/article/193317666/midseason-ranking-of-mlbs-top-10-farm-systems/ 1) MIL 2) NYY 3) HOU 4) PIT 5) LAD 6) WSH 7) BOS 8) PHI 9) ATL 10) COL Here's their Sox wrap-up: The Red Sox have the thinnest system on this list, in part because president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski used it liberally to make trades for Craig Kimbrel and Drew Pomeranz. But Boston still has the most dynamic duo of prospects in second baseman Yoan Moncada (No. 2) and outfielder Andrew Benintendi (No. 7), and backs them up with high-ceiling talents in third baseman Rafael Devers (No. 23), left-hander Jason Groome (No. 40) and 105-mph righty Michael Kopech (No. 81).

Here's a read on Beni's call-up... http://news.soxprospects.com/2016/08/transaction-analysis-breaking-down_2.html